1.3.6 Marketing Strategy

Marketing Strategy

Key Definitions

Marketing Strategy: A carefully evaluated plan for future activity that balances company objectives, avaliable resources and market opportunities. 

Mass Market: A market type that sells to the general population by creating products that have universal appeal such as general toothpaste.

Niche Market: A market type that sells to a smaller segment of the larger market, usually creating products for specific needs, such as sensitive toothpaste.

Customer Loyalty: When a customer develops an emotional attachment, based on things like love or faith, to the brand, beyond just making repeat purchases.

Business to Consumer:  A model that shows the transactions that occur directly between the business and the consumer.

Business to Business: The type of transaction that occurs between a business and another business, such as manufacturer to wholesaler.

Marketing Mix: The 4 components any business should consider when marketing a product. This consists of what the product is, the price of the product, how the product will be promoted and where the market will be.

Homogenous Goods: When there is no degree of differentiation between products, so every product is exactly the same, forcing the competition focus to be on pricing. 

Product Differentiation: The degree to which a consumer sees that your brand is different to another brand through the features and the unique selling point.

What are the Keys to Successful Marketing?

A strategy is the business's long-term plan to achieve the company goals or targets. Choosing the best strategy involves finding a fit between the company objectives, customer requirements, and the activities of competitors. Planning is meant to help shape the company's activities and products to generate the best return on their investments. Marketing strategy involves adding value, taking advantage of any unique selling points and helping the business identify the right mix between design,, function, image and service.

Strategy is About the Future

By calling it a 'strategy' it is implied that the business is looking to the future. It is important to look at the future prospects of the business instead of what works well now for the business. Any business that aims to succeed will consider how they approach the future of their company. 

Strategy Must be Achievable

Strategy is concerned about what is possible, not just what the business desires. It should always consider company resources, and it needs to business to recognize its own limitations and potential. It should also consider the economic and social circumstances, as if the world economy is weakening, for example, export-reliant businesses will be more cautious about trading. 

Strategy is Company Specific

No two businesses will have the same marketing strategy as the strategy will reflect the individual circumstances of the business. Within the same industry one company may adopt a strategy to increase market, whereas another may adopt a strategy to reduce costs to compete in price.

Marketing Strategy is the marketing plan of action that:

• Contributes to the achievement of company objectives
• Finds the balance between objectives, avaliable resources and possibilities
• Looks to the future
• Is carefully considered and thought out
• Is realistic

Marketing Strategy for Mass Markets

To succeed in a mass market the brand needs to be differentiated in a way that makes it interesting and unique, but not niche. The marketing strategy has to be done to make sure that the brand seems appealing to everyone, and the marketing would focus on making the brand distinct on the market to a point. If this is done successfully, the mass market brand can enjoy:

• Distribution levels close to 100%
• Control over advertising and promotion
• High levels of control over pricing

Marketing Strategy for Niche Markets

Marketing strategy within a niche market needs to have a patient approach. Customers within niche markets are often experts on the product category they need, so they could be very 'fussy' over their purchases. The majority of the marketing focuses on reinforcing what makes the product distinct fro other brands, focusing on the distinctive characteristics of each product. 

Marketing Strategy for Business-to-Consumer Markets

The key to successful marketing is to ensure that every element of the Marketing Mix is co-ordinated towards delivering a marketing strategy that fits in with the marketing objectives. A business that uses the Business-to-Consumer model will find this easy as the consumer expects a real product or service that conforms to the image and therefore delivers value for money. In most cases the image is at the heart of the proposition, which makes keeping the image vibrant and distinctive a critical focus of the Marketing Mix. 

Marketing Strategy for Business-to-Business Markets

This involves a business selling to another business, such as a wholesaler to a retailer, or a manufacturer to a wholesaler. The key aspect here is that these markets have different priorities to Business-to-Consumer markets, as businesses buy with no emotion involved. They just want the best product for the best price. Fancy advertising here is unnecessary.

Adapting the Marketing Mix for Business-to-Business Markets

• In some cases businesses sell homogenous goods to other businesses, making price the most important factor in these situations. 
• Specialist businesses will need specific materials for their products, making the product the most important factor. 
• Certain manufacturers want to adopt a "just in time" production strategy, making the production location and the location of suppliers the most important factor. 
• Unless the brand is iconic the big supermarket chains require producers and/or suppliers to fund regular price promotions, making promotion the most important factor

How Businesses Develop Customer Loyalty

Customer loyalty involves the development of a deep emotional connection to the brand, to the extent that customers are willing to forsake all factors in order to buy the latest product from the brand. The heart of this connection comes from the product or service, and the starting point is to study the customers, and to make sure that every aspect of the customer experience suits the customer. 

However customer loyalty is also about more than just the product. It is also about the emotional attachments that can be formed. The emotional connection to the brand can also be something formed based on childhood experiences and attachments, such as the associations with summer holidays, Christmas, and other special occasions. This type of marketing is highly skillful, and can also sometimes be considered manipulative.

Basically, marketing is about using emotions and the right image to appeal to the consumer and sell goods and services. The use of emotions and brand images is the reason why qualitative research is so valuable to businesses and is used so widely.